CIFS Share terribly slow.

[ap0]

Hello,

Before I state my problem here is my hardware stup.

I am running latest stable FreeNAS 9.3 on a SanDisk Cruzer Fit.
The main computer is a HP ProLiant Gen8 with a Intel(R) Celeron(R) G1610T @ 2.30GHz CPU and I switched the stock RAM with 2x 16 GB Kingston ECC RAM. I use four Wester Digital Red 4TB Drives in Raid-Z.

The ProLiant is connected via Ethernet to a TP-Link TL-SG105 Gigabit Switch which is connected to my main (and only) Router, a TP-Link Archer C7. My Desktop PC is also connected to that Switch.

The problem is that my transfer rates are terrible. I never get aboe about 8 Megabyte per second. Most of the time it is at 5 Megabyte per second - reading and writing from and to the share.

I have copied files of various size, mainly ripped Blu-Rays and DVDs, which I intent to stream with a Raspbery Pi 2, from a Linux machine and also a Windows 8 Laptop. The speeds are identical. This results in frequent stuttering Movies when streaming to the RPi2 OpenELEC device.

On the other hand using FTP to write data to the location where the shared directory is, I get following speeds:

I have checked the CPU usage while streaming of both the RPi2 and the FreeNAS machine.

The RPi2 peaks to 25% but goes down again very quickly. I don't think that high CPU usage is the problem.

So I guess my main problem beeing the CIFS share not performing as it should.

I have started using FreeNAS about 3 to 4 days back. My knowledge is quite limited yet. I don't know where to start troubleshoot. Let me know if there are config files or anything else I should post to help troubleshoot.

One remarkt though. In total I am running three CIFS Shares that point to different datasets. My personal, the one of my girlfriend and one to a share that we use together where all the media goes. If I copy data from my Linux machine to my CIFS share I get 50 Megabyte per second. Maybe because between me and the NAS there is only a switch? I just tried copying a 1,8 GB file from a Windows 8 Laptop to the Share of my girlfriend and never got above 3 Megabyte per Second.

 

[BigDave]

The use of NON-Intel NICs (clients AND servers) have a long history of issues
including those you have described. As for the laptop, if the connection is
WiFi, those speeds are to be expected (wireless sucks for everyone).
There are hundreds of posts within this forum addressing poor transfer
issues and my recommendation is to discover what hardware you have,
then change over to INTEL in those machines that allow you to do so.
If you have intel NICs (at BOTH ends), update your drivers (step #2),
and last step, check/switch your network cables.

 

[ap0]

But if NON-Intel NICs are so poorly supported how come every time I use FTP the speeds are far better?

 

[BigDave]

That protocol has always been faster than CIFS, but in this case your FTP results are
slow as well. I'm sorry, but maybe some others will pop in here and give their opinions.

 

[gpsguy]

Which machine is this?

You mention the Linux machine, your girlfriends laptop. Is this a 3rd machine?

If this is a 3rd machine and it has a gigabit ethernet wired connection to the switch, my guess, is that the cable is bad. We see this quite often.

As @BigDave said, if your GF's laptop uses a wireless connection, then it's par for the course. Wireless sucks.

You probably (just a guess) have a Broadcom NIC. They aren't too bad, certainly not in the same league as the Realtek NIC's. CIFS is single threaded, so most CIFS FreeNAS users will run a fast Pentium and/or Xeon CPU.

But, try swapping the cable first.

I never get above about 8 Megabyte per second. Most of the time it is at 5 Megabyte per second - reading and writing from and to the share.

 

[Bidule0hm]

You probably (just a guess) have a Broadcom NIC. They aren't too bad, certainly not in the same league as the Realtek NIC's.

I have one in my laptop that's probably worse than a Realtek if that's even possible... It doesn't want to stay in gigabit mode and goes back to 100 M. And it's not the cable, the switch or whatever...

 

[Ericloewe]

I have one in my laptop that's probably worse than a Realtek if that's even possible... It doesn't want to stay in gigabit mode and goes back to 100 M. And it's not the cable, the switch or whatever...

That's a new low. What model is it?

 

[Bidule0hm]

I'll tell you as soon as I'm at home ;)

 

[anodos]

@ap0: Post a debug file. "system" -> "advanced" -> "save debug".

In the meantime here are some things to try:
1) Directly connect your server to your workstation and set static IP addresses for both of them. Test your transfer speeds.
2) Temporarily disable any A/V and security software on the client computer.
3) Boot a Linux liveCD on your desktop computer and try making a transfer through its samba client. Is it any faster?

 

[Bidule0hm]

That's a new low. What model is it?

Awww man, even getting the model number is a pain in the *** with this NIC... I needed to use the vendor and device hardware IDs (VEN_14E4 DEV_1692) to finally get the model --> BCM57780

NB: I'm on Windows 7. Apparently there's the same bug on Linux: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1063038

 

[Ericloewe]

Awww man, even getting the model number is a pain in the *** with this NIC... I needed to use the vendor and device hardware IDs (VEN_14E4 DEV_1692) to finally get the model --> BCM57780

NB: I'm on Windows 7. Apparently there's the same bug on Linux: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1063038

I love how they have an insanely large family of GbE controllers, like you need more than one or two (cheaper consumer version and full-featured enterprise version, like Intel's i210 or i217/218/219).
Must be something like this:

• Drives @Bidule0hm insane by not actually working properly
• Works properly but is slow as molasses
• Works properly but doesn't do basic stuff
• Works properly and has i210 levels of functionality

 

[Bidule0hm]

Yeah, it's just ridiculous...

I mean it's not like if it was to hard to do a proper NIC... it's just corner cutting and whatever other wonderful things all probably because of the marketing dept.

I'm almost tempted to buy an USB 3.0/gigabit adapter :)

 

[Ericloewe]

Yeah, it's just ridiculous...

I mean it's not like if it was to hard to do a proper NIC... it's just corner cutting and whatever other wonderful things all probably because of the marketing dept.

I'm almost tempted to buy an USB 3.0/gigabit adapter :)

As bad as they are, at least they're stable.

What bugs me a bit is that Microsoft's Surface USB 3.0 GbE adapter does not have its driver available on Windows Update, even though it's probably an off-the-shelf controller (probably realtek, but they obfuscated everything, so it'd need disassembly). You have to manually grab the driver from the Surface drivers web page.

But, it does the job.

 

[Bidule0hm]

What bugs me a bit is that Microsoft's Surface USB 3.0 GbE adapter does not have its driver available on Windows Update, even though it's probably an off-the-shelf controller (probably realtek, but they obfuscated everything, so it'd need disassembly). You have to manually grab the driver from the Surface drivers web page.

Ok, THAT's ridiculous, you win :D

 

[anodos]

Ok, THAT's ridiculous, you win :D

Well, these fancy gigabit NIC things are relatively new tech and they have to still work off the rough edges, right?